


Rope Burns

by grayspider



Series: Bad Things Happen to Keith (Constantly) [1]
Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Angst, Bad Things Happen Bingo, Blade of Marmora Keith (Voltron), Blood and Injury, Canon-Typical Violence, First Aid, Homesick Lance (Voltron), Hurt Keith (Voltron), Hurt/Comfort, Implied/Referenced Torture, Interrogation, Keith (Voltron) Angst, Keith (Voltron) is Bad at Feelings, Keith (Voltron) is a Mess, Keith (Voltron)-centric, Kidnapping, Lance (Voltron) is a Good Friend, Lance is bad at First Aid, M/M, Poor Keith, Whump, rope burn
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-13
Updated: 2020-07-13
Packaged: 2021-03-04 20:53:43
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,007
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25232704
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/grayspider/pseuds/grayspider
Summary: He had missed the rendezvous point. The mission surpasses the individual. No one is coming for him.
Relationships: Keith & Shiro (Voltron), Keith & The Blade of Marmora, Keith/Lance (Voltron)
Series: Bad Things Happen to Keith (Constantly) [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1828009
Comments: 9
Kudos: 283





	Rope Burns

**Author's Note:**

> Bad Things Happen Bingo: Rope Burns
> 
> So my love for Voltron has been refurbished, and I realized I never wrote Keith angst. So of course, I needed to change that. If you enjoy, please consider leaving a kudos and a comment! Feedback is really what keeps me going. Also, feel free to comment on which prompt from the Bingo you would like to see next! 
> 
> Warning for mild language, description of blood and injury, and a brief, non-graphic scene of interrogation.

  
  
  
A growl rumbles at the base of Keith’s throat. It’s primal, and for a beat, he doesn’t even realize that the sound is coming from him. He can’t see anything; there’s nothing but a dark purple light that pours in the room from beneath the small slit in the metal door across the room. He’s not sure how long he’s been there, his arms pulled behind his back. The ropes tied around his wrists feel like thick, braided burlap rather than the smooth metal cuffs he expects. His struggling has rubbed his bare wrists raw. His Marmora suit is pulled away from his torso, leaving his upper body bare and vulnerable to the frigid chill of the cell.  
  
The silence gives him a moment to catalog his injuries. His wrists burn from where his skin is rubbed raw beneath the rope, and he feels a burn across his forehead. He remembers the searing pain of a laser strike grazing the side of his forehead as he took on the mess of druids in his final stand. As much as it hurts, he’s grateful he was hit with a blaster rather than a sword. The instant heat of the shot probably cauterized the wound immediately, so the last worry on Keith’s radar is blood loss. It’s a small victory, but he’ll take it.  
  
Hunger gnaws at his empty gut. They haven’t fed him, but Keith can’t say that he expects anything else. No one has spoken to him since they caught him fighting ten druids in the hallway in his final sprint towards the escape pods. Thace and Regreis had made it; Keith remembers faintly hearing them scream at him through their shared comms before the doors shut between them. He had missed the rendezvous point. The mission surpasses the individual. No one is coming for him.  
  
It’s a fate he’s already come to terms with. The Blade preaches nothing else, so he can’t afford for childish hope to flicker in his chest, but he isn’t resigned to his imminent demise. No one may be coming for him, but Keith never needed to be rescued by anyone in the first place. When all else fails, the only person that can keep Keith alive is _Keith_ . So, with fervor and grit, he twists his wrists in their bonds relentlessly.  
  
He stills as he hears footfalls in the hallway. Biding his breath, Keith presses himself as far against the wall as his body and binds will allow. They stop just outside of his door, and he can see a distorted shadow disrupting the minimal light that crawled in from beneath the door. Someone’s finally coming to say hello. Keith bites his tongue.  
  
The door slides open with a rumble, and he hisses against the light that comes pouring into the dark cell. It burns at his eyes, even through his squinted eyelids as he glowers at the tall, broad-chested Galra that steps inside. The first thing Keith notices is the saturated yellow of his eyes and the cat-like slits that stare down at him as the soldier steps in. The door slides shut behind him, and Keith’s eyes struggle to accommodate the darkness.  
  
“You’re small for a Blade.” The Galra’s lips twitch into a sneer as he speaks. His voice is nothing short of mocking.   
  
Keith rolls his eyes but stays silent. _Knowledge or death_ , Kolivan says. But when it comes to relinquishing knowledge, silence or death are the only options. And in a way, they go hand in hand.  
  
The Galra approaches him carefully, before a clawed hand clamps around his shoulder and slings him forward. With a grunt, Keith flies face-first into the floor, nothing but his nose to break his fall. He curls up onto his side, struggling to get himself into a defensive position now that he’s been pulled away from the wall.  
  
A deep, rumbling laugh sounds from the alien above him. “And weak too. You’ll be an easy one to break. Pity. I was hoping for a challenge.”  
  
Keith lifts his gaze, a fiery retort on his lips before he sees it. There’s a glint in the darkness. A flash of purple. His luxite blade sits in a sheath at the alien’s hip. Keith grits his teeth, swallowing his rage. _Patience yields focus,_ he reminds himself. He can’t allow his anger to blind him. If he wants to get out of here in one piece, he needs to _focus_ . 

The clawed hand returns and hoists him up by an iron-like grip on his hair. It tugs at his scalp, and the growl in his throat returns. The Galra seems only amused as his eyes glint and flicker in the dark. “Look at you growling like a kit.” A finger hooks under Keith’s upper lip despite Keith’s attempts to snap his teeth at him. “No fangs, though.”  
  
“I’ll give you a chance before the pain starts,” the alien warns. “ _Where_ are you and the other pesky Blades hiding?”  
  
He clenches his jaw, jerking his head away to get the Galra’s hand away from him, but the fingers remain tight in his hair, keeping him pulled up off of the cold metal ground. He’ll die before he squeals. The dwindling numbers of the Blade of Marmora are already in danger. If Keith becomes a liability, the skeleton that remains of their organization is bound to crumble.  
  
“Not talking?” The Galra drops him without warning, and with his arms bound behind his back, Keith can’t catch himself. He collapses on his front.

Without warning, a heavy, metal-tipped boot crashes into his ribcage. 

▰▰▰▰▰▰▰▰▰▰▰▰▰▰▰▰▰  
  
The beating feels like it will never end, but eventually, Keith is left curled up on the ground, blood slipping past his wrists from where he’s struggled endlessly against the ropes. His ribs ache as he draws a shaky breath in. The Galra brushes himself off with a grunt before turning his back on Keith and heading towards the door. Bad mistake.  
  
Keith gives his wrists one final tug, the blood coating his hands and wrists providing enough slickness for him to slip free of the rope. He cries out in pain as his skin tears, but without hesitation, he growls deep in his throat and launches himself at the Galra from behind. The two go crashing into the ground, and with one arm wrapped around his interrogator’s neck, the other hand flutters down to _his_ blade holstered at his hip. He grasps the luxite weapon before yanking it free and bringing the hilt down on top of the Galra’s head in an arc. The alien crumples to the ground, and Keith wastes no time bolting from the ajar cell door and into the hall.  
  
He’s alone at first, though he doubts that luxury will last for long. He takes off sprinting down the hall, allowing his memory to guide him through the maze of corridors of the mining colony he’s trapped in. His blade flickers to life in his grip, extending into a full sword as he heads towards the heart of the colony where he and Regris had scouted a large hangar full of cruisers and other vehicles during their infiltration mission. It doesn’t take him long to find it, but along the way, he gains a few sentries on his tail, their guns firing at the ground beneath his feet.  
  
Keith’s breath rattles in his chest as he sprints, staggering from side to side in an attempt to dodge the bullets raining down from behind him. He instinctively moves to activate the particle shield at his wrist before he realizes that he’s in his _Blade_ suit, not his Paladin armor, and the suit is mostly destroyed anyway.

He stops and spins on his heel to send the edge of his blade through the chest of the closest robot before he continues his sprint. The pain of his bruised ribs and bloody wrists fade to nothing as adrenaline pumps through his veins and clouds his mind. It’s a similar feeling to the panicked and frantic anger that used to pump through him as he piloted Red. God, he misses her.  
  
Heart pounding in his ears, Keith twists around a corner until he comes across a large door with a hand-print lock off to the side. He slams his fist against the interface before retreating inside. He’s made it. There’s a small grouping of jets arranged in the center of the large hanger, the hole in the roof of the large hangar showing the galaxy sky. Relief burrows in Keith’s chest as he makes the final escape towards the nearest cruiser. He climbs inside, pressing his hands against all the buttons he can. He takes off a beat later, straight up into the sky as the crowd of angered sentries stares up at him from the ground. 

His hands tremble as he grasps the controls of the cruiser. The console is arranged differently from the ships he’s accustomed to during his time with the Blade, but his instincts are more than enough to get himself in the air. There’s no one chasing him now, and the pain wracking his body finally catches up to him. His wrists are a bloody mess, so much so that he can’t see the raw skin beneath the mess of red. For now, he tears pieces of fabric from the torso of his suit to staunch the bleeding. The skin stings and prickles as he presses the strips of cloth against the wound. A whimper dies in his throat. Once he makes it home, he will have plenty of time to lick his wounds. 

_Home._  
  
The word squeezes the air from his chest. It’s a sudden, jarring thought that he doesn’t even recognize before it’s weighing on his mind like a fog. Though the blade strapped to his back and the suit clinging to his skin belongs to the Blade of Marmora, it isn’t _home._ It’s a base of cold, ruthless soldiers who never hesitate to leave a comrade to die. He doesn’t blame them. That’s what the cruel reality of this war has created. But that isn’t home. His time with the Paladins has taught him that much.  
  
He knows where he needs to go, but that doesn’t change the steadfast fear that billows in his chest like a forest fire. There was lingering resentment last time he headed off for his training, but Shiro had returned and Keith wasn’t needed anymore. As much as he repeats that fact to himself, it doesn’t change the hurt that’s lingered in his chest since.  
  
Still, Keith finds himself drifting to Voltron’s last known location: orbiting a recently liberated planet, _Vivus_. 

▰▰▰▰▰▰▰▰▰▰▰▰▰▰▰▰▰

When he climbs from the cruiser, his legs shake beneath his weight. The Castle of Lions’ hangar is empty save for a distant blob of blue. His eyes widen as he hugs his bloodied arms across his chest, hiding them beneath his armpits. Lance stands at the center of the hangar, his helmet poised beneath his arm as he regards Keith with an uneasy smile.  
  
This is a mistake. He falters where he stands at the base of the ramp, debating turning and retreating into the stolen jet and flying away. Keith shouldn’t have come here. He doesn’t belong at the Castle anymore. However, it’s too late. Lance is walking towards him, and the longer he looks at the Paladin’s face, he finds more worry than resentment.  
  
“Keith! Buddy!” Lance says until he’s standing a few feet away from Keith. He leaves plenty of space between them. “We weren’t expecting you back. You finally decided you missed us too much, huh?”  
  
Keith keeps his arms hidden as he forces a shy smile for his former teammate. “Whatever you need to say to make yourself feel better, Lance.” The bite is weak, but it feels right. In a way, it reminds him of how homesick he’s been during his time with the Blade.  
  
_The Blade. They have no idea he’s even alive right now._ _  
_  
“Distant as ever, I see.” Lance’s voice feigns disappointment as he scratches at the nape of his neck. In a beat, his eyes widen as he takes in Keith’s disheveled appearance. “You look rough, dude. What the _quiznack_ happened?”  
  
He’s sure he looks less than optimal with the burn across his forehead and the blood coating his arms. That last beating most likely has bruises painted across his bare chest as well. “It’s kinda a long story,” he admits. Keith lacks the energy to put any more fire behind it.  
  
A frown twists on Lance’s face. He sets his helmet down at his feet before approaching Keith. On instinct, Keith’s brow knits together as he takes an uneasy step away from the approaching Paladin. This doesn’t deter Lance it seems, who simply storms forward until he has Keith cornered against the ship’s ramp. He pulls on Keith’s biceps, untangling his arms from around his chest.  
  
Lance’s face crumples even further, just for a moment, before it’s all replaced with a sad smile. Keith’s first instinct is to pull away, but Lance’s grip on his forearms is strong. He carefully reaches to unravel the scraps of fabric wrapped around his wrists. Keith chokes on a hiss, jerking away as his raw skin clings to the fabric.  
  
“Sorry, sorry,” Lance insists, his face going pale as he loosens his grip. “Jeez, Keith. How did you manage to mess up your hands this bad? You need to go to the infirmary.”

Keith tries to refuse, tries to insist that he’s _fine_ , but Lance isn’t taking no for an answer. He drags Keith forward by a grip on his elbow. Keith staggers to follow him, his gaze lingering on the fluorescent blue lights lining the walls as they snake the all too familiar path towards the med bay.  
  
He must space out, because next thing he knows, he’s sitting on a solid bench as Lance cards through a box of strangely labeled medical supplies, muttering to himself. “Don’t know how anyone can read anything of these stupid labels. How Pidge managed to learn _Altean_ is beyond me.”  
  
His vision is spinning as he stares at Lance’s back, his arms limp in his lap. He realizes how _exhausted_ he is. Since he’s joined the Blade as a more permanent member, any resemblance of a day and night cycle was completely demolished. Most of his sleep comes in short, disturbed naps he catches in the passenger seat of a cruiser or curled in the corner of the training bay at headquarters, though those days have become few and far between.  
  
“Keith? You with me?” Keith blinks and Lance is suddenly standing in front of him, eyebrows raised as he clutches what resembles a small first aid kid. He simply nods, eyes narrowing at the plethora of medical supplies clutched in Lance’s grip.  
  
“Where’s Coran? Or literally anyone else?” Keith asks wearily. Out of all of the Paladins, Lance had never shown any prowess when it came to applying first aid.  
  
Lance gasps, having the audacity to look offended. He drops the small kit next to Keith on the medical table as he flicks it open and starts to root through the supplies in them. Half of the tools inside look like they do more harm than good, but eventually, the Paladin pulls out a clear bottle and heaps of gauze squares.  
  
He turns his attention to Keith, pouring a bit of the clear liquid on the gauze as he moves to grab one of his arms. “Coran, Allura, and Shiro took the Black Lion and went down to _Vivus_ for some diplomatic junk. Hunk and Pidge are tweaking some mechanical stuff in the control room. Now, sit still. This might sting.”  
  
Keith hissed as Lance pressed the damp gauze against the inner aspect of Keith’s wrist. He forces himself to sit still, eyes scrunched shut. There’s a soft gasp from Lance as the blood clears away. The skin of his wrists burn terribly, and as Keith cracks an eye open he can see the horrific rope burn that marred his pale skin.  
  
“ _Dios_ , Keith.” Lance continues to wipe away the blood until his skin, swollen and puckered, is visible beneath the mess. “That’s a wicked rope burn. Buddy-”  
  
“I’m fine--”  
  
“Yeah, right,” Lance scoffs. He doesn’t press any further for a moment, falling into a quiet lull that is so _not_ Lance, that it leaves Keith uneasy. The boy has his focus solely on tending to Keith’s wrist. The patchwork is shoddy at best, but he carefully wraps them up with gauze after lathering some type of gel across the burns. It hurts at first, but the gel provides an immediate chill to the fiery pain. The tension in his shoulders bleeds away.  
  
Lance moves to carefully inspect the burn across Keith’s temple. He winces as the fingers brush against the wound. Lance whispers out a soft apology.  
  
He wants to blame the pain for his loosening tongue, or maybe he’s just way more home-sick than he imagined. Either way, he speaks before his brain can catch up with his tongue. “We were supposed to get intel about a Galra mining outcrop. But we underestimated how many there were. I missed the rendezvous. Got caught.”  
  
At Keith’s words, Lance’s face twists up. There’s a soft touch against his forehead as Lance presses a bandage over the burn across his temple. Keith’s surprised at the tenderness of the action, but he assures himself he’s just exhausted and delirious with pain. “They tied you with a _rope_?” Lance asks, incredulous. “Are you okay? Wait, no, don’t answer that. I know you’ll just lie to me.”

“Wait.” A beat passes. “If the Blade rescued you, why are you here by yourself? Why didn’t they even _try_ to fix you?” The surprise in Lance’s voice has deep anxiety settling in Keith’s gut.  
  
He swallows it down as it threatens to crawl up the back of his throat like bile. It burns on the way down. “Uhm, they didn’t,” he says bluntly. “I escaped by myself. I knew no one was coming for me.”  
  
Lance blinks at him, and Keith can practically see the gears grinding in his skull as he pieces the information together. “What? So they- they just _left_ you there?”  
  
The ways of the Blade are far different than the code of comradery between the Paladins of Voltron. Of course, it would be a shock to the Paladin, but Keith doesn’t even know how to begin to explain it to him. Long before the Blue Lion rocketed him into space, Keith fought for survival. It was ingrained into his very being, so if anything, it had been easier to accommodate to the harsh regime of the Blade of Marmora than it had been to find a place in the rag-tag found-family that Voltron had been. Not that he doesn’t miss it dearly.  
  
“I mean. Yeah,” Keith admits with a shrug. “It’s the mission above the individual, Lance.”  
  
His friend pulls a face at that, arms now crossed over his chest as he shifts his weight between his feet. It’s one of the only times that Keith can count when he’s seen Lance with genuine _anger_ etched into his expression, though he cannot fathom why it would be on his behalf rather than directed towards him. He can tell Lance has a plethora of comments to share, but for some reason, the boy bites his tongue. With a defeated sigh, Lance leans up against the cabinet of medical supplies.  
  
His resolve is startling to crumble as Lance stares at him. “I should go-”  
  
“Why did you come back here then?” Lance speaks over Keith, his eyes narrowed as he regards Keith carefully. The dismissal dies on Keith’s lips. “You’ve been pretty adamant about pursuing your Marmora training. Why come back here?”  
  
Keith’s lips press into a fine line. There’s nothing accusatory in Lance’s tone, nor does it feel like there is an actual question there. Still, Keith struggles to come up with an answer. He rubs his thumb against the side of his forefinger, anxiety building in his chest again as it burns at the base of his throat. His first instinct is to be defensive, to fly off the handle as Lance probably expects him to. But instead, Keith just feels defeated.  
  
“I guess… I dunno. I’ve been homesick lately.” Keith casts his gaze down to his hands, inspecting the messy layers of bandages covering the rope burn with a small, fond smile. He doesn’t see Lance’s reaction, but there’s a heavy pause in the air before Keith hears faint footsteps and Lance is suddenly sitting beside him on the medical table.  
  
The boy swings his legs back and forth, leaning back on his hands as he whistles. “Y’know, I get homesick a lot too. I miss the beaches, the smell the day after it rains a whole lot, and my mom’s garlic knots.”  
  
Keith bristles and looks up at Lance, only to find the boy’s eyes cast far off into the distance. A longing, fond smile lingers on Lance’s lips as he looks far off. Keith’s stomach does a flip. Lance is talking about _Earth_ , and as much as Keith misses normal food, there’s not much left on Earth to miss. The only things he had back there had been Shiro and the rickety old shack that belonged to his father. The shack he can easily leave behind, and Shiro’s with him in space.  
  
“I don’t mean Earth,” Keith says in a deadpan, staring at the side of Lance’s face.  
  
Lance turns to face Keith, eyes widening in surprise as realization settles upon his features. “Oh.” A beat passes. “So you _did_ miss us! Aw, Mullet-head!” His arms wrap around Keith’s shoulders before he can squirm away. He holds Keith tightly to the side of his chest.  
  
The hug is tight and painful to his sore body, but he can’t remember the last time someone has hugged him since the last time he parted ways with Voltron, so he savors it. He doesn’t know the next time he’ll be able to hold one of his old friends like this.  
  
Reluctantly, after a moment, Lance releases Keith from his hold with a sheepish smile. “Sorry,” he chuckles, scratching at his neck. “Look, Keith. I know that working with the Blade of Marmora is important to you. I get it, I do-”  
  
“Why do I feel like there’s a _but_ coming?”  
  
Lance rolls his eyes. “Because there _is_ one. Shush, don’t interrupt me.”  
  
Keith simply stares at him, lacking the energy to fight. He’s sure a lecture is coming, which has him crumpling inside because all he wants is to curl up against the cold metallic table he’s sitting on and fall asleep for the next twenty hours. Lance must see this in his expression because his features soften.  
  
“ _But_ , I don’t want you to think that you’re not welcome here. I know we’ve been pretty crappy lately when it comes to your training, and I’m so _sorry_ for that. But no matter what, you have a place here, Keith. You don’t have to kill yourself for the Blade of Marmora to prove your worth. You belong here. With us.”  
  
“Do I?” Keith snaps back, arms reflexively moving to wrap around himself. It’s a habit he’s had since he was a child, and even after all these years, it refuses to fade away. Keith averts his gaze because he suddenly feels far too vulnerable under Lance’s pensive eyes. It’s hard to accept the reality Lance is offering him, even when it’s the only thing he’s wanted to hear since he left. It’s the validation he’s searched for.  
  
Lance drapes an arm across Keith’s shoulder. “Yes, Keith. You are part of this family, Keith. No matter how hard you try to push us away.”  
  


It doesn’t matter how good Lance is at first-aid. The burns on his wrist are cool, and he feels better all the same.

  
  



End file.
